This reads like the sort of post that so often goes on bad logic riding on emotion, but it's a completely valid point.
I'm a Visa user, plus I don't plan on going anywhere near the Olympics despite living fairly close to London, but when I heard about this marketing plan I literally thought it had to be one of those hilarious fake news stories. But it wasn't.
Stuff like the McDonalds sponsorship he mentioned (banning people from selling chips) is bad, but at least as a consumer if you want chips... you can still buy them.
But this Visa deal, what on earth are people without Visa supposed to do? I just don't see how anyone sane could think this was a good plan, either from an Olympic organiser's point of view, or Visa's.
Oh, and the OP talks as if there's a difference between how international and UK people are affected by this, but that really isn't the case. Based on my own anecdotal evidence I certainly know many more people who have at least one Visa card than people who have at least one non-Visa card (myself for example, my personal debit card, personal credit card, and company credit card, despite being from three different providers, are all Visa), but there are still plenty of people using, for example, cards from MasterCard.
> But this Visa deal, what on earth are people without Visa supposed to do? I just don't see how anyone sane could think this was a good plan, either from an Olympic organiser's point of view, or Visa's.
It's been working for the past 26 years that Visa has sponsored every Olympics game. This isn't a new thing. This is what pays for the Olympics even occurring. Their sponsors are exclusive sponsors. Visa's already committed to the next 4 games as well (through 2020).
As far as Visa's point of view:
> According to the U.S. Sponsorship Tracker, a Visa commissioned study following the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games conducted by Performance Research, an independent research company, Visa cardholders
who were aware of Visa’s Olympic Games sponsorship claimed a 16 percent and nine percent increase in Visa card usage in Canada and the US respectively. The same report found Visa’s brand equity was 32 percent and 38 percent higher among consumers who were aware of Visa’s sponsorship in Canada
and the US respectively.
> This is what pays for the Olympics even occurring
Even conservative estimates of the final cost of the Olympics are around 10bn. Visa paid only 100m so I think the games would have been fine without them.
40% of the Olympic costs are funded by The Olympic Partner (TOP) program, of which Visa is a charter member. I was making a general statement about exclusive sponsorships making the Olympics possible, not Visa alone.
>But this Visa deal, what on earth are people without Visa supposed to do? I just don't see how anyone sane could think this was a good plan, either from an Olympic organiser's point of view, or Visa's.
I think both OP and you (or me, for that matter) don't have access to important data - specifically, what's the percentage of people that have BOTH Visa and MasterCard (and what percentage of those that do not, are likely to buy ticket for games).
If it's low - then it probably was a stupid move, although I don't really feel qualified to say that.
If, on the other hand, it's very high (like 90% (which I think it is)), then it's very smart move.
I suppose it depends on the demographic, if the olympics is mainly attended by relatively affluent people with multiple credit cards. I know plenty of people who don't even have a credit card beyond a bank issued Maestro debit card.
Even if the percentage overlap approaches 90%, I don't think it's a smart move. It's very anti-customer and will cause a decent percentage of people a great deal of angst and a much larger percentage of people will be quite disappointed. And don't forget that high-spending corporate travelers use Amex almost exclusively.
The problem with a payment provider striking an exclusive deal like this is that it creates very real problems for people unlike, say, and exclusive beer deal. And it creates a great deal of negative feelings towards both Visa and the Olympics. I'm sure Visa is able to show that it is a good deal for them. But I suspect it is just as easy to show the opposite. Not smart at all.
I agree, though I would think the ratio is the opposite. The thing is, having multiple cards might be a sign of wealth, but it's also a consequence of local culture. In some countries, everyone has a gazillion of cards. In some countries, having two cards is sort of an exception. In some countries, half the shops usually don't take VISA (Belgium is like that iirc, but I might be mistaken).
So, by taking a decision like that, you're alienating quite a few people, based on non-relevant criteria (not wealth related ones).
Well, anyone who was British and bought their tickets through the official UK process for buying Olympic tickets had to use Visa to pay for them anyway. I think lot of people bought their tickets through travel agents, though.
It seems like you and the author are assuming that everyone has some sort of right or reasonable expectation to be able to buy products with any payment method they choose. But that's rarely the case. There are tons of places that simply don't accept MasterCard or American Express, for example. Almost no place will accept barter. The only way this was a bad decision by Visa and the Olympics is if the sponsorship payment wasn't enough to cover the lost sales, which is unlikely to be the case.
Expectation? No. Desire? Yes! If someone goes out of their way to make me unable to use the form of payment I want, and that is accepted in many other places, I will dislike them, despite not having the "right" to use it.
I live just beside Victoria Park, about 0.5 miles away from the Olympic park. You would scarcely even know the Olympics are on by what I see in east London. If anything, it's much quieter than usual. Staying away on account of it isn't necessary. At worst, there's a little bit of delay on the A12 as it goes past one of the park entrances and narrows down to a single lane for 200m or so, but that's about it.
Humans make purchasing decisions in a fundamentally emotional way. Most of the best marketing out there trades on emotion.
People get pissed off and hold grudges in a completely irrational way. Think of all of the people who refuse to buy [BRAND X] because the first product they had from them eventually failed. Visa just went out of their way to have a lot of people hold grudges against them.
But this Visa deal, what on earth are people without Visa supposed to do?
I do not have a Visa card. I have one Mastercard and one Discover card, plus my PayPal credit/debit card which is also Mastercard. The only Visa I've had in years have been those prepaid rebate cards.
But I don't think it's VISA that we should be blaming but the Olympic Committee that agreed to this and the McDonald's deals. They didn't have to accept those conditions.
Why do you drive a Honda instead of a Toyota or GMC or Ford or Kia? A credit card is a credit card. I did get 5$ cash back on a lot of travel I did for work like hotels, restaurants, etc., so that was one reason.
Yeah but both Hondas and Kias can drive on almost any road. That's not the case with Discover acceptance, though I understand it's a lot higher in the U.S.
I'm a Visa user, plus I don't plan on going anywhere near the Olympics despite living fairly close to London, but when I heard about this marketing plan I literally thought it had to be one of those hilarious fake news stories. But it wasn't.
Stuff like the McDonalds sponsorship he mentioned (banning people from selling chips) is bad, but at least as a consumer if you want chips... you can still buy them.
But this Visa deal, what on earth are people without Visa supposed to do? I just don't see how anyone sane could think this was a good plan, either from an Olympic organiser's point of view, or Visa's.
Oh, and the OP talks as if there's a difference between how international and UK people are affected by this, but that really isn't the case. Based on my own anecdotal evidence I certainly know many more people who have at least one Visa card than people who have at least one non-Visa card (myself for example, my personal debit card, personal credit card, and company credit card, despite being from three different providers, are all Visa), but there are still plenty of people using, for example, cards from MasterCard.